Meetings this month with Sandy towards a convergence at Vanuatu’s TORBA day in October. Tommy and team recorded a formal invitation to the Tulalip community from the Ureparapara community, the community displaced from Rowa the main island for producing shell money in the past. The Chief of the Ureparapara made a general invitation on video inviting those interested in seeing the production of shell money to come to Ureparapara and Banks Islands to witness the practice of this cultural heritage. In Tommy’s words it is “a genuine standing invitation issued by a proud chief to all people”.

Though it is unclear whether this connection can happen for TORBA Day 2018 or 2019 we are exploring designing creative workshops on the islands, facilitated by Further Arts, to work on the values and access rules that can underpin a self-sovereign digital archive and towards prototyping objects embedded with media and story.

Further Arts begin their documentation of the stories of Ambae. A technical plan is formulated towards immersive documentation of culture on Ambae (360 video and photogrammetry). Funds sought for a media team with expertise in immersive capture to support Vivien Obed and Vanuatu-based media practioners who are working with the Ambae community through Further Arts. Draft of MIT application logged: MIT application

Permanent evacuation from Ambae reported. Further Arts invited by the people’s Paramount Chief, Benuel Garae, the President of the Ambae Island Council of Chiefs, to document Ambae culture with the Ambae community as they leave the island.

Further Arts interviews conducted on the culture of Shell Money and value in Vanuatu.
Maryka Paquette (UN, WISN) brings vital funding for an invitation to remote communities in Vanuatu to share knowledge with the Tulalip Community in NW America. Further Arts leads a journey and interviews on Shell Money -
a specialised local currency called Som - and record an invitation from the the Banks Islands to to the Tulalip to attend the Dung Verei Festival and share practices.

During this development phase international interest in the relationship between traditional/local currencies and crypto-technologies such as blockchain grows and Further Arts explores how these technologies could assist the sovereignty of cultural ownership.

Tracey Benson gathered together collaborators at SCANZ Canberra and forms Trans-Art Alliance, a network that supports the growing creative collaboration with communities in Santo, Vanauatu.

Ceremony held simultaneously betweeen groups in Vanuatu, Australia, Scotland, France, England and the US. eaving relationships between cultural producers, technologists and creatives with a shared intent.

The first evacuation of Ambae galvanised the network to shift from regular online meetings towards action with Sandy from Leweton Community and Shelley Darling organising shipments of water filters to the affected communities in Ambae.

Leweton Residency, Vanuatu

2016 - 2017

Foundational work with Further Arts and the Leweton Community in Santo. Katharine Vega and Toby Gifford visit on an artist residency. Test shooting and recording story with 360 video techniques and binaural audio recording.

Audio listening and immersive communication workshops with partner galleries in Australia and UK and at the NIMES festival under the name of “Trust”. Connecting with Sound networks for acoustic ecology. Toby, Sandy, Tommy, Kate working on a way of holding media related to the land. Exhibiting in the first Sensory ecology show for the Gympie Gallery curated by Leah Barcalay.

Art COP21:
Hacking Reality

2015 - 2016

Creative Activism during ArtCop21 Paris. Creative co-ordinated storytelling on the streets and seed planting. 360 creative documentation of the protest activity and the ceremony on the morning of D12 bringing together many indigenous communities outside Notre Dame Cathedral.

The CASCADE starts as an experiment in creative activism & storytelling networks - created across different media streams by many people - improvising experimental communication networks to invoke alternative healthy relational futures for human cultures on earth.

The project kicks off with an opening ritual by the water in England in mid-Winter at a cascade in Hastings(recorded by hydrophone): a group prayer for a living creative space in which sustainable vital futures can live.

This developed into collaborative public workshops in Brighton, UK and a takeover at the ONCA gallery for the Festival of Climate Ideas: story telling on the streets, projection portals, knowledge share and seed bombing workshops in preparation for the work in Paris for the COP21.